


Silent Witness

by gwyllion



Category: Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-09-14
Updated: 2009-09-14
Packaged: 2017-11-26 20:47:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/654261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gwyllion/pseuds/gwyllion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This was written for the Sun and Water Challenge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Silent Witness

She picked her way through the tall grass, careful to step only on the flat stones that littered the ancient path. The damp ground squished with any misplaced footstep into the grassy muck. Champagne mist hovered over the meadow, the air so heavy it wouldn’t be long before it fell to dew. The step stones sweated in the haze. Her hands pushed the slender reeds aside, the sun streaming down in diagonal spires, glinting off the flowing water in the distance. The creek would be running high with the snowmelt.

She sometimes wandered this way, to the secret place on the bank that only she and one other person knew. She regretted that she hadn’t been granted the spare time to visit nearly as often as necessary, but the life of a ranch wife made demands of her time, with few stray moments for quiet reflection. Dragonflies hovered in the humidity. The buzz of Junebugs sounded the alarm through the unseasonable warmth of the spring air. Soon the insects would be flying toward shelter beneath a window ledge or wrapping themselves in a lingering autumn leaf, dead, dried and brittle, but serving a purpose in nature nonetheless.

A storm was coming. Several feet of snow had fallen in the western mountains overnight, according to the voice on this morning’s radio news program. It seemed impossible that the weather was so different only a few hundred miles away, on the other side of Wyoming. The animals that lived here seemed unaware of the disturbance that would soon arrive.

She moved forward, determined to reach her favorite spot on the sandy bank to spend a moment away from her wifely chores. If he hadn’t emerged from the water at that very moment, she might have walked in full view of his beachfront camp. The tall lean boy shook the wet drops from his curly head and sloshed through the chilly spring runoff, striding uphill on the submerged sand to the tent beneath the pines. She wanted to cry out, “Get off my property!” but the improper tenor of his nakedness kept the warning from escaping her lips. She covered her open mouth with a quick hand and tiptoed sideways through the muck to get a better view of the stranger without revealing her position.

He sat on his haunches and reached into the tent for a towel, drying his body well and leaving the rag draped across his head while pulling on a pair of faded jeans. The boy was about her son’s age, she thought to herself, embarrassed at her own willingness to take in the vision so unabashedly. His sun-freckled face turned toward her, but she was too well hidden for him to notice. Zipped and buttoned up, he resumed his drying, rubbing his hands over his covered head, the towel dangling down over his eyes and ears. He did not see the other boy rush out of the woods dropping his canvas sacks, scattering supplies, but he felt the unseen arms wrap around him, the second boy tackling him to the ground.

She covered her gasping mouth again, wanting to warn him against the attacker who pinned him with both arms and legs, muddying his naked back which she noticed only when the once clean boy rolled onto his side, gaining the upper hand in the contest. Both boys’ laughter could be heard over the flow of smooth water that separated their beach from her watching place. The first boy didn’t seem upset that his skin was now caked in dirt. He smiled and pressed his lips to the other boy’s mouth. She hadn’t expected to see such a token of passion exchanged by any two people on her morning walk, least of all the strange boy and her own son, Jack.

Her Jack? Her baby. Lureen’s husband? Her mind raced, although she knew enough about her own son to realize that he wasn’t happy in his role as a father and spouse. He hadn’t been expected until Monday, when he would arrive to help his daddy with the fences and stock. She struggled to understand why he was camped on the edge of their homestead’s property when he was supposed to be on a fishing trip in the mountains with his friend, Ennis Del Mar. Ennis, Ennis Del Mar, she turned the name over in her head, and with the right amount of force, the unknown pieces of her son’s life began to fall into their places.

“I can’t believe it took a blizzard to finally get you to come to Lightning Flat, Ennis,” Jack said, rising to a sitting position, pulling off his boots and socks.

“Hmmm,” Ennis propped himself up on one elbow and squinted toward the trees across the creek.

“Lucky we got camp packed up before the snow, probably just get some rain here.”

“Snow’ll melt before I have ta head back to Riverton, sure enough.”

“I wish you’d let me introduce you to my ma before the week’s over. I know she’d really like to meet ya, En.”

“Now, you know there ain’t no way that’s gonna happen,” paying more attention to rustling leaves than Jack’s suggestion.

“And why not? She already knows all about you, mostly.”

“C’mere you,” Ennis said, satisfied that nothing in the surrounding woods warranted his attention and turning his eyes to his former assailant. He pulled Jack down onto him and cradled his head in his lap, stroking his hair for a moment, before leaning in for another kiss.

Jack turned over and crawled his way up Ennis’s body, straddling over him, barely touching.

“You gonna let me love ya right out here in the wide open today, Cowboy?” He pressed another kiss onto the freckled boy’s lips. “What do ya say?”

“No, Jack, let’s go inside, huh? You know how I feel about that.”

Jack stood and pulled Ennis up by his hands. “Ennis, someday, yer gonna be old and gray, and yer gonna be wishin you were young enough ta roll around outside in the dirt with me.”

“Hmmm. Fer a minute there, I thought ya was gonna say I’m nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room fulla rockin chairs.”

“That, too. Now get yer ass in that tent, boy,” Jack playfully shoved him along.

They tumbled into the tent, sealing the flap against the outside world.

The silent witness smiled and understood. Unseen, she made her way back to the house where her afternoon chores awaited her. Years later, she would remember this day and recognize the sun-freckled lover when he returned to Lightning Flat to claim what was rightfully his.


End file.
